Clink, clink….They reached the bottom stair. “Stay close,” the demon cooed, “and look nowhere ungraced by my light. Aamon did not build his Archives with mortal souls in mind.”
The Messah did as bid, though he thought the warning odd. This seemed to him little different than his father’s office at night when he was still a child: a floor of petrified wood, shelves towering ever upward, endless numbers of dusty tomes and piles of scrolls. More than once he considered snatching a book, but each time Phenex would screech before he’d even lifted a finger. “You humans are always the same! Your curiosity and greed get the better of you, then the next thing you know, your soul is being ripped to pieces by the Devil!”
“The Devil?” It was the first time he heard one of demon fail to use the title, king.
The macaw stopped and turned and stared at Adam side face. “You truly want to know?” He gestured with his candle toward a stack of scrolls. “That one there—no, not on top! The bottom, yes, there!”
The Messah pulled the roll of parchment from beneath its brethren on their shelf. He expected a cloud of dust, yet there was hardly a mote. It seemed a demon had handled these recently. That made Adam wary. “What does it say?”
Phenex resumed their journey through the Archive maze. “Read it for yourself.”
The pastor’s son tossed it back onto the shelf, ran to catch up with his guides hastened pace.
The demon sighed, “You see, this is why no man shall be left standing come the time of reckoning. They are too craven to see the darkness inside themselves, and because they won’t look, they think themselves pure. Too pure—no, too arrogant to beg for forgiveness. They’ll side with these demons in the end, I know it, and I alone shall be forgiven.” They stopped before a black stone well, a strange sight surrounded by book shelves, and foreboding. There was no rope or ladder by which to descend, only steam like warm breath emanating from its mouth. “We have arrived,” Phenex cooed. “The Kennel Master’s lies be damned.”
“You want me to fall down there?”
“Woo, I believe it was you who expressed the desire to fall.”
Adam peered over the edge and saw nothing but mist, heard only the faintest churning of water. Don’t be craven now, after coming all this way. He gripped the rim of the well to hold his body still—without glancing away from the depths, “So, what was it that was written in that scroll?”
Cooing ensued in short burst of laughter. “It’s too late to ask that now. You had your chance.”
“Yeah, that’s what Naberius said, that it was too late for me, that I wouldn’t be coming back.” He paused, listened as the demon puffed his plumage. “But still, I want to know. And didn’t you want to show me? You picked that one for a reason, right? What was it?”
“It’s a story about a boy who betrays his own tribe. He goes through Hell for it, but then he climbs out again with newfound power and freedom.”
Adam couldn’t believe it. “Truly?” he asked. “That is the wisdom too dangerous for mortal eyes?”
“No,” Phenex answered, “It’s just my favorite record in the Archives, but the others all call me foolish for clinging to such farfetched tales.”
“They’re right, you know? But not because of your favorite story.” The Messah swung his legs over the rim of the well and sat gazing into the embodiment of fear. “It’s because you talk too much about yourself. All those things you said about humans being too craven to look, that’s truly about you, isn’t it?”
There was silence, the tiny tinkling of a chain, and the churning of the waters. The mist was warm wafting up from the well. Adam could feel his toes again. He hadn’t noticed they’d gone numb. The he realized too that he’d been stalling, letting precious seconds slip through his fingers. I have to go, he told himself, but just on the cusp of speaking the words, the demon uttered,
“Yes.”
All became darkness as pastor’s son felt shackled hands shove into his back, as he plunged ever further toward the steady sounds of a swirling tide. In the black, he might have fallen a foot or forever—time a thing relative to the race between his heart and mind. What if this was all for nothing? What if he had just spoiled his chances stalling for a few more seconds because he didn’t possess the courage? Would he even have been willing to jump had it not been for the bird? Or was that his plan to provoke the push? Strange questions, those final two. They begged him a third: “Who have you become, Adam of Babylon?”
His body emerged from warm and shallow waters. A voice asked him again, “Who are you?” The Messah bolted upright, splashed onto his feet.
“Did I make it in time? Is this the Refinery? Are you—”
“Asmodeus,” the voice answered, deep as the pitch.
Adam spun in the dark, stopped on the trinity of glowing jasper eyes. They were enough that he could see silhouetted the angel’s body, membranous wings and melted flesh clinging to its bones. And he could smell the demon smoldering—almost feel the heat like fire. “Am I too late? My father and Magdalynn, do you still have them? You didn’t already—”
“I enjoyed that trick you played on Phenex. And the one you set upon yourself. Clever deception for a pastor’s son, though it would be expected from a bishop’s. But you’re not quite either of them, are you, Adam? Who are you?”
The Messah drew his sword, “I’m me and
